As a journalism major, it’s often pretty hard to find networking events that cater to that specific major. You have to be lucky to find people with experience in the field at that event. Luckily, I did.

I attended a networking event put on by the Griff Center back in January held in the Grupp Fireside Lounge. It was certainly more geared towards students who were business, science and education majors, but I decided to go anyway, feeling it wouldn’t hurt. A bunch of alumni came in to talk about what fields they were involved in and connect with students. This included a segment where all the alumni stood in the front near the podium and stated their name, profession, and what year they graduated.

I did listen in on what some other people had to say, but the person that related to what I wanted to do the most was a teacher who worked as a freelance writer on the side. She mentioned how she did some work previously for Buffalo Spree, which I had interned at in the fall, so that gave us something to talk about. She also talked about how she manages to fit in the freelance work with her other job, which led me to think that having a second job on top of my writing could be possible.

I would say I benefited from this by knowing that even if the majority of people at the event aren’t geared towards what you want to do, you can still find something you have in common with the people there.